Taxi industry sends message on ride share concerns
REGINA A taxi industry group is behind a Regina billboard calling on Premier Scott Moe to not make the “ride share mistake.”
The electronic billboard, located on the southeast corner of Saskatchewan Drive and Elphinstone Street, comes as SGI pushes forward with a regulatory framework for services like Uber and Lyft. The billboard urges Moe to “stand up for taxi families.”
Sandy Archibald, manager of Regina Cabs, confirmed her taxi company is part of an industry group responsible for the billboard. The group includes a few other companies in the province that are“very concerned” about regulation for ride-sharing services in Saskatchewan, she explained.
Archibald said there are about 1,000 full-time taxi jobs in Regina and Saskatoon.
“What will happen if ride share comes in, unlimited, in those cities? What will happen to those jobs?” she said. “How are those people going to make a living?”
Archibald said the group doesn’t oppose ride sharing in principle, but wants drivers to be subject to the same regulations as taxi drivers. She called for criminal record checks, cameras in cars and vehicle inspections to “level the playing field.” She also expressed concerns about surge pricing, which allows ride-sharing companies to adjust fares to fluctuations in demand.
“We’re not in favour of decreasing the regulations for the taxi industry,” Archibald said. “But if they have lower regulations, then why do taxi drivers have to go through higher regulations?”
The billboard is only one part of an extensive lobby effort, including meetings with officials at SGI and other agencies. Archibald feels like they’ve reached “an end point.”
The province has seemed determined to bring ride-sharing services like Uber and Lyft to Saskatchewan, with Joe Hargrave, minister responsible for SGI, saying it will give people another option to avoid driving drunk.
Legislation paving the way for ride-sharing services was passed in the spring, but ongoing consultations have stretched the subsequent regulatory process longer than some expected.
Archibald said she can’t predict what the government will do. She said the lobby effort is about putting the industry’s position forward and hoping that it’s heard.
Once the regulations are finalized, it will be up to cities to pass their own bylaws governing the ride-sharing sector. The City of Regina budget proposal released last month suggests a licensing system is likely, though a report has not come to council laying out what it will look like.
A spokesperson for the City of Regina confirmed that a report, including a bylaw for ride sharing, is expected early in the new year. It will be brought forward once SGI announces its regulations, she said.
Saskatoon has gone further in crafting its own model, with city council voting in July to move ahead with drafting ride-sharing rules. It foresees 600 ride-sharing drivers and the same minimum price that taxi drivers currently charge. But a bylaw will not be completed until the SGI regulations become public.
While Archibald said her group’s message is primarily directed at the provincial government, she also hopes for public support. But she admitted that’s a difficult thing to achieve through a billboard.
“It’s a complicated message to get to the public in a few words,” she said.
—With files from Phil Tank